|
Both of the
extracts reproduced below are of some interest in their own right, but
are presented here together for you to “compare and contrast” to use a
favourite exam writer’s phrase. In case you wonder, we didn’t make up
the last sentence of the first extract – the name is just a coincidence
and we are not aware of the two men mentioned here being related.
~
The following is the entry in 627 Squadron’s
Operations Record Book for 4 July 1944.
4 a/c
detailed for operations: this was later increased to 11 a/c, which took
off to mark a dump in the CREIL area, and dropped 6 Red Spot fires, 16
Red TIs and 8 Green T.I.s Oboe T.I.s went down between 0126/0129 hrs.
and were accurate. Flare dropping commenced at 0127 hrs and were well
placed. Marking was made difficult by the large amount of smoke from
T.I.s and flares, but was accurate. Main force bombing commenced at
0133 hrs, and there was a direct hit with a 12,000 lb bomb dropped by a
Lancaster of 617 Sqn. 1 a/c took photographs, and one sortie was
abortive owing to the generator being U/S. Fighter activity was intense
on the routes in and out. In the operation against CREIL, F/L N. LEWIS,
D.F.C. (navigator) carried out his 100th operational sortie.
This extract
from the ORB mentions an attack on a dump in the Creil area. This is
misleading. The operation concerned was in fact the highly successful
attack on the major German V1 storage site in limestone caves at St Leu
d’Esserent, near Creil. The attack was both heavy and concentrated, the
storage tunnels collapsing and burying more than 2,000 flying bombs.
The effects
of this raid were felt almost immediately in a marked reduction in the
scale of the V1 bombardment of London. As a result our fighter and AA
defences became less saturated and we were able to shoot down a higher
percentage of the missiles aimed at London. Before the attack on St Leu
40% of the flying bombs entering our defences were shot down.
Afterwards our success rate rose to over 50%.
~
In 1936 Cecil Lewis wrote Sagittarius
Rising, a memoir of his time as a Royal Flying Corps pilot. The
following episode from this book occurred on 4 July 1916, the “Fourth
Day of the Somme” as it were, 28 years to the day before the raid
described above, and just 50 miles to the north.
We wanted to
drop a bomb. It was not strictly our business, and our machines were
not fitted with bomb racks; but there were bombs in the store, and we
felt they should be dropped.
We lay on the
aerodrome in the sunny grass with the map before us.
“First,” I
said, “on what shall we drop a bomb?” “There is a house beyond Pozières,” said
Pip. “It is not demolished. It might be a dump. It probably could do
with a bomb.” (He is dead now; but I remember how he looked at me
sideways, finger on map, and smiled.)
“We must
calculate the height and speed, and allow for the wind.” “Do you know
how bombs work?” he said.
“No; but I s’pose we can find out. There
ought to be a fuse with a pin to pull out, or something.”
We considered it carefully. It was the
fourth day of the Somme battle, and anything that could be done ought
to be done. Besides, a bomb! – it might do any amount of damage….
We
will fly this way….Four thousand feet….Seventy miles an hour….Measure
it carefully….Allow for the wind….We’ll drop it
from there. We went to the Major. “We want to drop a bomb,” we said.
“All right,” he said. “Where?” And we told him. That afternoon we set
out. The Sergeant stood by nursing the bomb. He lifted it up and placed
it gingerly on Pip’s knees. It was a twenty-pound bomb, and Pip held it
in his arms like a baby.
“It can’t go
off, I suppose, can it, Sergeant?” he inquired mildly. “Not till you
pull out the pin, sir,” replied the Sergeant. “But mind how you chuck
it overboard, sir. See it doesn’t touch anything.” He thought we were
mad. (On reflection, we certainly were.) We climbed up to the lines.
When we got over the spot, I turned and nodded. Pip pulled out the pin
and dumped the baby overboard. We circled and watched it falling. Then
we lost sight of it and looked at the house. It was still there. Then –
a flash and a cloud of dust about a hundred yards away. We returned
home, strangely elated.
“Did you hit it?” said the Major. “No.” “I didn’t
think you would.” He was reflective. “Still, you dropped it. That’s
something.” For days on patrol we used to look for the crater it had
made. It seemed a friendly crater. Then we forgot it; but we never
bothered to drop another bomb.
|